Sunday, February 28, 2010

My Republican Family

I've talked about this publically on more than one occassion about how many of my family members are Republican, but the unauthorized use of some of my video footage from an interview in a Republican PAC's attack ad got me to thinking.

Essentially the ad goes after Jay Kleberg, a Republican in HD 78 primary squaring off against Dee Margo and Rene Diaz, for voting for Barack Obama in the last election.

Kleberg said his vote for Obama was a protest vote because he didn't like what the Republican Party had become over the last eight years. He's certainly not alone.

Hell, REPUBLICANS are even reluctant to identify with their own party name. I was covering a Republican Party event last week and Bobby Ortiz, a former Congressional candidate for Congress, said he doesn't consider himself a Republican but rather a Conservative.

That remark drew applause from everyone in the room (okay, except me).

But some have put forth the idea that if Kleberg voted for Obama over McCain for president that he is somehow not a "real" Republican. Real as opposed to what exactly?

Thanksgiving before last my Dad was really sick and we spent a lot of time in the hospital. It was the first time I really had the chance to sit and talk with some of my dad's siblings, most of whom happen to be Republicans.

While my dad was as liberal as they come, my tata was as conservative as they come. He was Richard Nixon conservative. In our home we always had a picture of John Kennedy hanging on the wall. In my tata's house, it was a picture of Richard Nixon. (Which might explain why I am so liberal on social justice issues, but have a conservative streak in me when it comes to fiscal issues and my stance on life).

The bottom line is that many in my family were Republican Latinos before the GOP got smart and realized that Latinos were a group they should be recruiting.

Many of the Republican members of my family voted for Obama. Mostly because they didn't like the direction Bush was taking our country in. Think about it, if you are a Reagan Republican, you really couldn't be all that proud of Bush's spending and assault on the Constitution.

In fact, my uncle Bernie, a Repulican who supported Obama partially due to McCain's inability to support a particular veteran's issue my tio was advocating for, was asked to lead the Pledge of Allegiance when President Obama visited Phoenix on February 18, 2009.

That was the day my dad died. He knew my dad would want him to go and he went. He made us proud. He was one of those REAL Republicans, like others in my family, that voted for Obama.

The way one of the matriarchs in my family put it, "We didn't leave the Party, the Party left us."

The fact that the Tea Party is so successful is partially due to the frustration many traditional conservatives have felt with the GOP. And lets not forget that the "Maverick" from Arizona, John McCain, really wasn't all that much of a Republican. That's part of the reason Palin was put on the ticket in the first place, because she appealed to traditional conservatives.

And people who like the term "maverick".

So now a Republican PAC wants to paint Kleberg as something less than a "real" Republican?

2 comments:

Anonymous
said...

NOT Anonymous, couldn't find URL?Manny Hinojosa, the only El Pasoan from the Traditional Family Values Controversy with the COURAGE to run for city council district 1 instead of just talk and talk and talk. written by Manny HinojosaNOT anonymous

Who was the Douchebag of December?

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